New Ventures at arteBA's 2017 Edition

The 26th edition of arteBA will be held from Wednesday, May 24 to Saturday, May 27 at La Rural exhibition center in Palermo, Buenos Aires. Since its founding 25 years ago, arteBA has established itself as one of the most important fairs in the region and as a meeting point where international galleries and their artists come together with collectors, art professionals, museums and other cultural institutions.  

Following arteBA’s 25th anniversary, this year’s edition proposes new ventures, welcoming over 90 galleries to participate in the main section and curated sections, from 19 countries: Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, France, Germany, Japan, Kosovo, Mexico, Peru, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Spain, the Dominican Republic, the United States, Uruguay and Venezuela.  

This strong international presence will be further accentuated by the Networking Program, developed in order to stimulate the creation of partnerships and collaborations between the Argentinean art scene and other entities abroad by way of invitations to curators and directors of art institutions from all over the world. In 2016, over 60 guests from 14 countries (see complete list) participated in this program, in addition to the international speakers taking part in Open Forum, an arena for debate featuring leading figures from the art world that is open to the public, and the collectors who attend each year to take part in the VIP Program, which includes visits to museums, art galleries, dinners held in private collections, cocktails and events in different locations throughout the city.  

Sections and Curators

For the Main Section, an autonomous committee comprising Ana María Battistozzi (independent curator, Buenos Aires), Orly Benzacar (Director of Ruth Benzacar gallery and President of the Cámara de Galerías Meridiano, Buenos Aires), Ignacio Liprandi (Director of Ignacio Liprandi Arte Contemporáneo gallery, Buenos Aires), Eduardo Brandão (Director of  Vermelho gallery, São Paulo) and Sabine Schmidt (Director of PSM gallery, Berlin) selected 54 galleries, 15 of which will participate as Special Projects involving up to 3 artists, while 16 will exhibit one or more emblematic works by a single artist in the Cabinet selection (Advisory Committee: Ana María Battistozzi; José Luis Blondet, Curator of Special Projects of LACMA, Los Angeles; and Luiza Teixeira de Freitas, independent curator, Lisbon).

On the other hand, Chris Sharp (writer and independent curator, Mexico City) will be Guest Curator for the U-Turn Project Rooms section, which highlights the latest tendencies in contemporary art, and Sofía Hernández Chong Cuy (Curator of Contemporary Art at the Patricia Phelps de Cisneros Collection, New York and Caracas) will be in charge of the Solo Show section, where galleries present individual projects by Latin American artists. In addition, the Barrio Joven section will feature galleries and proposals of an experimental nature, selected by a team led by Raúl Flores (artist and independent Project producer, Buenos Aires) and Miguel López (Chief Curator for TEOR/éTica and co-founder of Bisagra, Lima).  

The Future  

Within the framework of our 2017 edition and with the objective of continuing to foment reflection on a topic discussed in the first two issues of the new arteBA magazine, “The Future” will be the central figure in the upcoming edition of the Fair, in its Open Forum as well as in the Dixit exhibition section. With the future as a thematic point of departure, Agustín Perez Rubio (Artistic Director of MALBA, Buenos Aires) was invited to design and coordinate the conference series of the Prime Time, while Javier Villa (Curator of Museo de Arte Moderno de Buenos Aires) and Sarah Demeuse (writer and independent curator, Brooklyn) were invited to curate the 4th edition of Dixit, to which an exclusive space of over 600 m2 is dedicated.  

A new edition of the Isla de Ediciones will also be held, where a curatorial team made up of Mariano Mayer (poet and independent curator, Madrid), Gastón Pérsico (artist and graphic designer, Buenos Aires) and Cecilia Szalkowicz (artist and graphic designer, Buenos Aires) invite publishers and independent editorial projects to participate, stimulating increased circulation of editions specialized in contemporary art.  

Lastly, arteBA will once again feature the Acquisitions Program for Local and International Museums, which promotes collecting on the part of institutions while contributing to their patrimony. In last year’s edition, a record number of 53 works acquired by museums and businesses was achieved.  

arteBA represents a unique opportunity to meet other art world figures and to discover the cultural wealth that Buenos Aires has to offer.